


sour taste for your sweet taste buds

by sandpapersnowman



Series: ACEE: Preacher Season 3 [2]
Category: Preacher (TV)
Genre: Blood Drinking, Episode Related, F/M, Gunshot Wounds, Injury Recovery, Missing Scene, Season/Series 03 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-13
Updated: 2018-07-13
Packaged: 2019-06-09 17:04:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15272196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sandpapersnowman/pseuds/sandpapersnowman
Summary: The bullet hits quick, through and through, and he goes down anyway just because ithurts.





	sour taste for your sweet taste buds

**Author's Note:**

> doin it..... makin it WORK....... getting these fics OUT.... i need to go SHOWER
> 
> for season 3 episode 2!! title from the wombats' [Headspace which is a REALLY GOOD cass/tulip song and i recommend it](https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/wombats/headspace.html)

The bullet hits quick, through and through, and he goes down anyway just because it  _ hurts _ .

Jody and T.C. run off, and Tulip crouches down over him with a sigh.

He tries to play off how scared he was for her, make jokes about her rotting to avoid thinking too hard about how they almost lost her, and instead of joking along and downplaying it too, she says she loves him.

Tulip  _ loves _ him. She's started calling him 'Cassy' and he hasn't decided yet whether he hates it or not, and she probably doesn't mean she loves him the same way she means it when she says she loves Jesse, but it's still  _ something _ .

She helps drag him back into the house while she apologizes -- something about  _ I thought Jesse was leaving us again  _ and  _ I really hate those people, Cass --  _ and even though he already knows the pain is going to be so much worth with the slow healing animal blood offers, he'd rather not heal at all if it meant Tulip not having to go through that kind of distress.

She lays him back on the bed and he grunts, exit wound pressing too hard even against pillows.

"Sorry," she mutters, and powerwalks to the bathroom in the way she says she absolutely doesn't do, but does. She returns with washclothes and towels and gauze.

He's not paying much attention, just feeling her go through the motions as she props towels under his shoulder blade and brings a bowl of water to clean him up.

Warm fingers brush his chin, and then he's paying a  _ lot _ of attention.

"Sorry," she says again, undoing the button at his neck. "I don't want you healing clothes fuzz under your skin again."

He wants to laugh, because it'd been horrible and uncomfortable and he'd ended up asking her to help him dig it out within a couple days.

"Okay," he says instead, almost in a whisper.

Tulip's fingers slide down his chest as she unzips his jacket. Drying blood tugs painfully at the entrance wound when she peels his jacket back, but she makes it easier just by smiling at him and wincing with him.

Soon he's shirtless and his wound is mostly patched up, and all that's left to do is heal.

"Listen," he says, reaching for her hand hovering over his bandage. "There's a machine out by the swamp. If you don't look at it too close 'nd just put a jug under the faucet on the side, that'll be enough to get me back on my feet for now."

"'Don't look at it too close'?" she repeats.

"Mm... Maybe just get T.C. to do it, actually," Cassidy amends. "He likes gross shit. Ask him."

"How much do you need?"

Cassidy starts to shrug, feels his wound pull, and decides not to with a pained hiss.

"Dunno. Couple cups should be good and then I can go hunt down an alligator or something."

Tulip snorts. "If you don't need that much, just take it from me," she suggests. "Now that I'm alive again, and all."

Cassidy snorts too.

"Save your blood, love, you need it more than I do."

"It's my fault you don't have blood to drink," she says. "I'm the asshole that jumped to conclusions and fucked up your supply. Let me give you mine."

Cassidy licks his lips. He's tasted Tulip's blood a couple times in the past -- never for  _ fun _ , of course, just when they were rushed and couldn't do anything else for him. Even then, Jesse would usually step in before letting Cassidy bite Tulip. Cassidy has only ever bitten her while nearly unconscious from pain or injury.

"I'll be fine with the other stuff, really," he says quietly.

Tulip straddles him carefully. She settles over his waist, not his hips, where it's not  _ necessarily _ sexual, but the hungry look in Cassidy's eyes is still mirrored in hers.

It's not necessarily...  _ Not _ sexual?

"Do you want fresh, hot, people blood, or not?" Tulip asks.

Cassidy feels like she means to come off like she used to -- teasing, knowing exactly what she's doing to someone and playing innocent like she's not -- but it feels different. It feels too real with her holding herself so she doesn't put her full weight on him, and her nerves are evident in her voice.

"Probably better than liquefied swamp critters," he decides. His nerves are evident, too, even though he's trying to make it casual again.

She laughs and he can feel her bounce from it, and  _ that's  _ a train of thought he isn't going to let himself explore while Tulip is still on top of him, about to do him a real big, sexy favor.

"Do you wanna bite me yourself?" She looks down at her wrists and rubs a thumb up her inner arm. "Or should I get something?"

Cassidy swallows back drool and anticipation.

"Would  _ you _ be okay with me biting you?" he asks in return.

Tulip licks her lips. Cassidy wonders if she even notices, because her eyes are still locked on her own wrists.

"Yeah," she answers without hesitation. "Would  _ you _ ?"

It's a dangerous question, but Tulip already knows the answer; she moves her hand close enough for him to  _ smell _ the blood under the surface, and he slides his fingers up her arm to pull her wrist closer.

He has to look for the vein first, which she knows, but she still takes in a sharp breath when his tongue drags over her skin a little too slow and a little too sweet.

"Do you have to do  _ that _ ?" she asks, a little too breathlessly.

He grins up at her, tongue still pressing over her wrist.

"Well, I want to be  _ sure _ , Tulip," he insists. "Wouldn't want to mess up, right? Have to bite again and again?"

He punctuates himself with a gentle dig of his teeth. He expects a laugh, or an eye roll; instead, he gets neither, her heartbeat pounding quicker against his mouth and her expression betraying  _ some _ kind of eagerness.

"Would you get on with it?" she asks, pressing her wrist up with fake impatience, his teeth catching on her skin again. "I have things to do."

"Of course," he purrs, and gives her one more moment to ask him to stop before he takes the bite.

"Shit," she hisses, blunt teeth still managing to cut through her skin easily.

Cassidy looks up at her in a way he hopes is apologetic, but her blood has already hit the back of his throat and it's all he can do not to moan.

"I always forget how good this is for you," Tulip grits out. "Does it taste different because you're not human, or is it just an acquired taste?" she jokes.

He starts to pull off to answer her, but her other hand winds into his hair and holds him to her wrist instead.

"No, keep going," she purrs.

Cassidy doesn't even  _ try  _ to hold back the noise he makes.  He hasn't had fresh blood in too long, and it's been even longer since it's been like this -- blood from someone that cares about him deeply, deep enough it's in their blood, and it makes him want to cry because he can taste love in her veins. Maybe the same kind of love Jesse would taste, maybe not, but,  _ God _ , it's enough.

He doesn't know how long he drinks. Tulip pulls him away eventually, whispering quiet apologies for apparently having to yank on his scalp so hard to get him to let go.

Cassidy licks over the tears in her skin and those start pulling back together too, numbed enough from saliva that it shouldn't bother her.

He flops back and sighs, the searing pain in his shoulder blade when he hits the bed nowhere near as bad as it'd be for a human. Her blood thrills through him as it soaks in.

"You don't taste the same," Cassidy finally says, still licking blood from his teeth. "You still taste  _ human _ , but there's something off about it."

"Do you think I should worry about it?" Tulip asks.

Cassidy shrugs, the wound in his collarbone spitting flesh over itself and becoming whole again. The pain is getting lighter, too, and in an hour it'll barely be a dull throb.

"Probably. Probably not," he says honestly. "Do we really have time to worry about it?"

She gives him a huff, agreeing that there's no use in speculating on something pretty far down their metaphorical To Worry About list, and climbs off of him. She sits on the edge of the bed and runs her fingers through his hair again, her pretty brown eyes following the line of skin sealing itself into a pink scar on his chest.

"Are you going to be okay?" she asks softly.

He puts in the effort to refocus his pupils so he can properly meet her eyes. 

She's not asking about the bullet, he thinks.  _ Are you going to be okay when we finally make it out of here? _ is what she's really asking.  _ Are we _ going  _ to make it out of here? _ is what she should probably be asking.

"Yeah," he answers,  _ yes _ to all of the above. "Thanks, love."

They're going to make it out of here.

They're going to make it out.


End file.
